Rating: 
Summary: Good pickup for SF Bay Area-based readers
Review: In general, I liked Dave Eggers' book. The guy has an amazing talent to take a mundane incident (like an interview with MTV for a possible "Real World" role) and examine it every which way to Sunday. Before you know it, he's taken 30+ pages to describe what is probably an hour-long event. I think he's in on the joke, folks. He knows it's mundane; he knows it's weird to spend 30 pages talking about it. But he's going to do it anyway. And, frankly, the deeper he gets, the funnier it is. For example, the scene where he meets Pud (of "Real World SF" fame), is flat-out hilarious.Which brings up a point I want to make, one that I think is underserved in these reviews: if you're living in the SF Bay Area, or if you've recently vacated the premises, you owe it to yourself to read AHWOSG. Eggers eye and ear for San Francisco in the mid-90s is amazing. His late-in-the-book rant about why he's fed up with the city and is looking to leave is pitch perfect. It crystallizes the thoughts of a lot of people here. He's got a really good take on Berkeley's unique characteristics as well. Don't take the title seriously and you'll have a great time with this one.
Rating: 
Summary: Ten, Twenty, Thirty Stars
Review: This book is a heartbreaking work of staggering genius; it is also (to put it otherwise; and please excuse the metaphor) a mind-blowingly brilliant work of mental pornography. Eggers dares to publish aspects of the psyche that are ordinarily left private, unexposed, and even altogether overlooked. Fortunately, the psyche on display here--and this wouldn't be the case with just any psyche--looks spectacularly good even or maybe especially in its barest and least disguised form. By "spectacularly good" I mean: unusually fine, nicely sculpted, athletic in ways that dazzle, illuminated from within, beautifully toned, frequently seductive, breath-taking from certain angles, so exquisite it's unacceptably painful sometimes, very difficult to resist, and simply mesmerizing. You can't really take your eyes off of the performance (I didn't stop reading till I had followed each and every permutation of thought to its final destination); and when you've finished reading the book you long somehow to converse with this psyche or mind or whatever it is that you've been staring at and laughing along with and learning a lot from and feeling both enthralled and deeply moved by all this time. A fascinating experiment in publication--what counts as a publishable detail of consciousness? and what are the various ways in which it can be published?--AHWOSG is also a brutally tantalizing exercise in self-exposure. The self exposed here happens to belong to someone who's got enormous talent, a richly intricate mind, and a gorgeous soul. This book is dangerously, intolerably good. Five stars do not suffice.
Rating: 
Summary: a talented writer but not a genius
Review: This book had potential, and if only a good editor had toned down some of the overly instrusive self-conscious elements, it may have been accurately titled. But what could have been an interesting narrative technique was, in the end, too self-indulgent and distracting. The story itself is very touching and interesting on a personal and societal level. Or maybe I'm just too old? Anyway, I'm looking forward to his next book. I think I'll give Dave Eggers another chance.
Rating:
Summary: Good and then slow
Review: The book is greatly written and laugh out loud funny. The authorship is unique in his ways to outline and present information. Different writing styles are unique. There are some parts which I had to skip, mainly his style of run-on thought writing. Run-on is interesting, but becomes quickly boring in the same paragraph. However, the book begins great and races to great lengths with the relationship between him and his brother, but as the book starts shifting focus to him and his magazine... the story becomes a little more laborous. However, I strongly recommend this book for anyone looking for a good read.
Rating:
Summary: I was sad when it ended.
Review: Yes this book does sort of ramble. Some said this was a bad thing, yet I thought it added a personal touch. It wasn't just what was happening but it was what he was thinking and how he was feeling. It was beautiful. You felt Dave's heart bleed on these pages. You felt how he felt, You went through what he went through. This is exactly how a book should be. sure, he may have come across as a tad self-absorbed, but for god's sake, it's an autobiography. If you're looking for good wholesome perfect people to worship, go get a fantasy novel.
Rating:
Summary: A Hipster-Doofus Makes Good
Review: Dave Egger's unorthodox bestseller is a book written for the twenty-something, proactive, slightly offbeat audience he tried to reach with his magazine, Might. It is at times laugh out loud funny, poignant, and a wonderfully introspective piece of writing, but it can also be pretty annoying. Throughout, Eggers wants to remain casual, fun loving, and humorous, but sometimes, it is obvious that he is trying too hard and it really detracts from the book. On the other hand, there are enough very good passages to make you want to keep reading and willing to endure the dull sections. It is a very interesting story about the death of his parents, relationship with his friends and siblings, and his attempt to start a magazine, and I certainly came out liking and caring about the characters, which was probably one of his main objectives in writing the story the way he does. I think anyone prepared for a well written, though certainly uniquely organized, book that will make them laugh and think about the consequences of being a twenty year old orphan will like the book. I would caution, however, that it is a stereotypical Gen-X type book, in that it moves at the pace of MTV, sometimes ignores deep feelings and thinking, and tries to be "different" than what has previously been written. All of that being said, however, I would definitely recommend it for someone in the market for a good, contemporary memoir.
Rating: 
Summary: don't let the title suck you in - really 0 stars
Review: ...The writing of this book is in a steam of consciousness type of writing and meanders from place to place. The introduction and prefix seem to be the author’s initial notes, doctored a little to add more pages to send to his publisher. I really cannot tell you anything beyond about page 50 because I closed it up and started to wonder if I could return the book to where I bought it and trade it in for another author that I have read before. If this is a gen-X-ers book it indicates that the attention span of this age group has really diminished and I hope that their mental functions have not followed suit. Perhaps the best thing about this book is that it shows that it takes a lot of types to make up the world, and it is a blessing that all of them do not like the things that I like. It keeps the lines where I go short and sweet.
Rating: 
Summary: Starts great, wears thin!
Review: What a compelling story. The author, a twenty-something, takes on the responsibility of a much younger brother after his parents die within weeks of each other. I was carried along for a while just by the facts given and the feelings the story genereated. After a while though, the writing style became too much to deal with. It was convoluted and tedious all at the same time. Eventually I lost patience, and gave up in the middle. Usually I stick with a book till the end, even if just to see how things work out. Not this time, although I wish the author and his brother a happy ending.
Rating:
Summary: A Heartbreaking Look at Modern Ornithology
Review: Mr. Eggers' daring look into the oft-disturbing world of ornithology manages to both fascinate and perturb lifelong ornithologists and new bird lovers alike. Eggers, a retired professor of Ornithology and cricket coach at Cambridgeshire on the Hastings, dares to take an unorthodox look at birds through the eyes of their prey: the food they eat on a daily basis. His lively foray into the oft overlooked niche of Arizona Waterfowl also makes for brisk reading. An audio CD accompanying each book helps novices note the distinctions between the mating calls of such rarities as the Common Snipe, perhaps, and Bonaparte's Gull. While some might find his challenge to Linnaeus' system of binomial nomenclature to be heretical, the debates over modern naming methods is welcome and riveting. An excellent supplement to "Newman's Birds of Southern Africa."
Rating:
Summary: AHWOSG
Review: excellent book for late twenty-somethings; the title is absolutely true
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